■ China
North Koreans seek refuge
Seven people believed to be North Koreans rushed into a Japanese school in the Chinese capital seeking refuge yesterday, the latest in a steady stream of defectors from the Stalinist state. Technically, Chinese police would be allowed to enter them to arrest the refugees. One of the latest defectors carried a note requesting asylum, Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda told reporters. "There was a memo on a piece of paper in English saying, `We are North Korean. We want to go to South Korea. Help,'" Hosoda said. China treats North Koreans as illegal immigrants and has an agreement with North Korea to send back those it catches. Some 44 North Koreans are believed to be still holed up the Canadian embassy in Beijing while the South Korean consulate protects as many as 130.
■ Japan
Fischer to go to Iceland
Former chess champion Bobby Fischer wants to be released from detention in Japan to go live in Iceland, which has offered him residency, even though he is wanted on criminal charges in the US, a supporter said yesterday. Fischer -- believed by many to be the best chess player ever -- has been sitting in Japanese immigration detention for six months after he was caught trying to board a flight for the Philippines with an invalid passport. He is fighting a deportation order to the US, where he is wanted on charges of violating international sanctions against Yugoslavia for playing chess matches there in 1992.
■ Hong Kong
Graft-fighting boss missing
The Communist Party boss of a county in southeast China had disappeared a few months after saying he had received death threats because of his crackdown on corruption, a Hong Kong newspaper said on Friday.
Huang Jingao, party chief of Lianjiang county in Fujian Province, was taken away by unidentified people on Wednesday and his wife also vanished the same day, the Ming Pao Daily News said, quoting unidentified sources. In August, Huang wrote a letter to the online edition of the People's Daily, the party mouthpiece, saying he had worn a bulletproof vest for six years and was shielded by bodyguards after receiving death threats which he linked to his fight against corruption.
■ Bhutan
Sale of tobacco banned
The Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan yesterday became the first country in the world to impose a complete ban on the sale of all forms of tobacco. Smoking was also banned in all public places. There would be no monetary fine for those caught smoking, but they would be let off with a warning, officials said.
■ Denmark
A Muslim Little Mermaid?
Unknown perpetrators dressed Denmark's best-known tourist attraction, the "Little Mermaid" statue, in a traditional Muslim robe on Thursday in a protest over possible Turkish EU membership. "Turkey in
the EU?" read a sign hung around the statue, covered from head to foot in the black "burka" worn by many devout Muslim women, Danish broadcaster DR News reported. In Denmark, 49 percent are against opening talks with the mainly Muslim state, according to a Gallup opinion poll. The bronze statue of a naked mermaid sitting on a rock on the seafront in downtown Copenhagen is based on a Hans Christian Andersen fairytale.
■ Germany
Anger over Hitler cartoons
An artist who depicted Adolf Hitler as a pop-art style cartoon figure at an exhibition near the former Dachau concentration camp said on Thursday he would close the show two weeks after it opened due to public outrage. Walter Gaudnek said his brightly colored artworks aim to provoke people by showing Hitler
as a human rather than
a monster, but Jewish community and local political leaders see the images as dangerous. The bold, over-sized drawings show clusters of figures and swastika flags. In one, Hitler is seen speaking from a podium flanked by Nazi guards, while a girl with long blonde braids listens intently.
■ Germany
Ice Age flute unearthed
He is better known for his hunting skills, but now it appears that Ice Age man did not merely chase
prey -- he was also
fond of music. German archaeologists on Thursday revealed that they had discovered one of the world's oldest musical instruments, a 35,000-year-old flute carved from the tusk of a now-extinct woolly mammoth. The flute was dug up in a cave in the Swabian mountains in southwestern Germany, and pieced back together again from 31 fragments. Its discovery suggests that
Ice Age man, who roamed across Europe during prehistoric times, had precocious aesthetic talents, and probably discovered music far earlier than previously assumed.
■ Colombia
Car bomb targeted Uribe
Security forces on Thursday found a car bomb meant to be used in an attempt to assassinate Colombian President Alvaro Uribe,
the attorney general said. Attorney General Luis Camilo Osorio did not say who was behind the plot to kill Uribe, who has put the fight against Marxist rebels and cocaine traffickers at the center of his administration. Police found 7kg of the explosives was hidden in a tire in the trunk of the car
in an industrial part of the capital, Bogota. Three people were arrested, Osorio's office said, without giving further details of the plot.
■ United States
New clue for depression
Scientists studying depression said on Thursday they found evidence that a common genetic variation affecting how people manage stress predicts how much benefit they get from taking antidepressants. Researchers have long known that half the people found to be suffering from depression show signs of elevated anxiety. The new report, published in the journal Molecular Psychiatry, is the second in a week to pinpoint a genetic difference that could help doctors tailor antidepressants to those who would most benefit.
■ United States
Presley sells all Elvis estate
Lisa Marie Presley is selling most of the estate of her late father, Elvis, for about US$100 million. Under the deal, Presley will retain ownership of her father's Graceland estate but sell everything else, including the rights to the Elvis name and image, to businessman Robert Sillerman, founder of the music and sports pro-moter SFX Entertainment. The agreement will pay Presley US$53 million in cash, absolve her of US$25 million in debt owed by the estate and give her a US$20 million stake in the publicly traded company set up to manage the Elvis brand. Presley, who is the sole heir to her father's estate, will keep Graceland open to Elvis fans.
■ Switzerland
UN finds bugging device
The UN said on Thursday a secret listening device had been found in a posh meet-ing room of its European headquarters in Geneva. The room was used by ministers from major powers last year during private talks on Iraq following the US invasion and occupation. Marie Heuze, chief UN spokes-woman in Geneva, con-firmed a report by Swiss Television which said work-men found the device in wooden panels in the room. A Geneva-based security expert said the system appeared to be of Russian
or Eastern European origin. Its size indicated it was three or four years old, before such circuits were minia-turized, he said.
■ France
Dumas faces more charges
Former foreign minister Roland Dumas, acquitted in a corruption scandal, went on trial again Thursday on charges that he profited illegally from the estate of Swiss artist Alberto Giaco-metti. Dumas, 82, was being tried along with noted auctioneer Jacques Tajan in a breach of trust case that stemmed from a sale of the artist's works. Dumas was executor of the estate of the sculptor, who died in 1966, and his widow Annette, who died in 1993. Tajan sold nearly US$8.6 million of Giacometti's works in 1994 to pay inheritance taxes. Giacometti's estate, held by a foundation, is estimated to be worth of US$388 million, and includes 3,661 works.
■ Peru
Rebel jailbird hot to trot
A rebel leader told a court on Thursday he was suffering mental problems because of 12 years of no sex and tough jail conditions. "Since I am subjected to this sexual abstinence ... because of such an unjust and inhuman [prison] regime, I suffer from a certain [mental] imbalance and sometimes I forget things too. I have problems concentrating," Victor Polay, leader of the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement, told the judge. Polay, 53, who is married with three child-ren, has been held in a top security jail on a naval base near Lima since his recapture in 1992 following a sensational tunnel escape.
■ Colombia
Irish bombmakers convicted
Three Irish men convicted of teaching leftist Colombian guerrillas how to make bombs have escaped the country and are at large outside its borders, Attorney General Luis Camilo Osorio said on Thursday. "Unfor-tunately, we know they left the country but we will try to find out what country has received them in order to see that justice is done," he said. A top court on Thursday sentenced Jim Monaghan, Niall Connolly and Martin McCauley to 17 years in prison, overturning their June acquittal on charges they were Irish Republican Army members who gave bomb-making lessons.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of